Valley students awarded Larry Lewis scholarships for higher ed goals

PORT ISABEL — Five Rio Grande Valley students have each been awarded $2,000 scholarships from the K.L. “Larry” Lewis Scholarship Foundation to further their higher education goals.

An awards luncheon took place June 17 at the Laguna Madre Water District administrative office.

This year’s recipients are Sasha Ortiz, a graduate of Brownsville Veterans Memorial who plans to attend Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, N.Y., where she plans to major in software engineering; Sofia Garren, of San Juan, who has enrolled in Houston Christian University, planning to major in business administration; Guillermo Gutierrez, who plans to attend Texas A&M University-Kingsville; Laura Gonzalez, who plans to attend the University of Texas at Austin; and Manuel Rodriguez, who plans to attend the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.

The scholarship effort was named after Lewis, a 40-plus year volunteer member of the association who worked to gain the legal framework of the foundation.

Larry Lewis Scholarship Foundation

Lewis presented a history of the scholarship’s evolution prior to the scholarship awards.

Lewis’ volunteer work, he said, came in conjunction while serving as a vendor for Valley-based utility districts. He and his wife Martha, known also as BooBoo, owned and operated Valley Armature Works in Edinburg before retiring and turning the business over to their sons.

“It (the scholarship program) really started out as a building fund project that was initiated when we planned to buy or build a facility in Austin,” Lewis said. “Then our local members questioned why we would build something in Austin when we were a Valley-based organization.”

The foundation opted instead to invest in the youth of the Valley by establishing a scholarship program to benefit family members of water utility employees.

The scholarship committee expanded the effort by conducting benefit fundraisers including skeet shoots and drawings.

“It was slim at the beginning, but now some 20 scholarships have been awarded to college-bound students over the life of the program,” Lewis said.

Lewis credited the foundation’s membership, vendors and board members Mari Zanelli, Eric Hayden, Joe Villesquez, Joe Fonseca and Javier Santiago for the success of the scholarship effort.